


Not An Honourable Man

by the_moonmoth



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Abuse, Alternate Universe, Comment Fic, F/M, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Sexual Abuse, Triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-03
Updated: 2011-10-05
Packaged: 2017-10-24 07:05:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 15
Words: 3,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/260467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_moonmoth/pseuds/the_moonmoth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Series of vignettes, written in response to the prompt “AU in which Joffrey gives Sansa to The Hound and like any good dog, he steals away with her to hide her.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for shadow_belle. This story is... unpleasant in places. Do heed the warnings. In particular, one of the characters is triggered, which may itself be triggery.
> 
> If you like reading to music, these are my two theme songs for this fic: [White Blank Page](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sw-ko6aINI4) and [I Gave You All](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhlyEqBPcyo), both by Mumford and Sons.
> 
> Comments feed the author :)

"Be sure to make it known how badly I've treated you," the Hound rasps and after the long journey and even longer anticipation of what he will do to her when they arrive, Sansa wonders if he's having some jape at her expense. After all, he hasn't laid a hand on her except to help her up and down from her horse – not the treatment she has come to expect from one of Joffrey's men.

It takes her several weeks to realise what he meant by it. The King just happens to drop by Clegane Keep on his way to pay a visit to his mother at Casterly Rock. Sansa waits on him in the Hound's solar, cowed by his leering glances and blunt innuendoes. When the Hound grabs her around the waist and pulls her into his lap she shrieks in surprise and Joffrey's expression is delighted. And Sansa knows, then – she is only here because the King has delegated her ongoing torment to a man he trusts.

Later, in the privacy of the room the Hound gave her with the heavy bar on the inside, it makes her smile.


	2. Chapter 2

Sandor had returned from King's Landing just in time to find a stable hand trying to steal away with his little bird. He hadn't liked to leave her but he was still in the King's Guard, and besides he had thought her safe. The boy will pay the price of Sandor's miscalculation.

He tries to fight back, but his effort is pathetic. Sandor doesn't even unsheathe his sword, using fists and brute strength to beat the boy to the ground. In his mind's eye all he can see is Sansa's pale face as she struggled against the boy, her look of relief when she saw him. It's more than he ever thought to get from her, and it terrifies him both the way his heart had pounded, and how close he had come to losing that completely. The boy is still now, body limp and bloody on the ground, and distantly he hears a voice.

"That's enough."

He had said the same thing once, and no one had listened. He raises his fist once more. A small hand touches his arm and he swings around to see Sansa Stark, her face a dispassionate mask.

"If you kill him, questions will be asked."

She's right. He lowers his fist. But the blood lust is on him and she's standing closer than she normally does. His cock throbs in his breeches and he takes one step towards her before clenching his fists and turning away. He stalks back into the keep and straight to his room, where he leans against the door and rips his breeches open, taking himself in hand and stroking viciously once, twice, and comes with a shout and a curse.

His heartbeat has barely slowed when a knock at the door heralds his little bird carrying a steaming washbowl and cloth. She says nothing as he lets her in, placing it on the table before leaving again. He watches her the entire time. It's obvious what he was doing in here. It's obvious what he wanted from her out in the yard. He would've expected her to stay away. But she's nothing if not dutiful, his little bird.

She pauses in the doorway, her back still to him when she says, "Thank you." She hesitates a moment longer, as though there is something else, but then seems to think better of it, and leaves him to get cleaned up.


	3. Chapter 3

Being in the King's Guard, Sandor was not meant to be able to hold lands or a title, despite his brother's demise and the lack of another heir. Joffrey had made no mention of passing Clegane Keep to someone else, however, and when Sandor had taken Sansa there after Joffrey had gifted her to him, the King had seemed fairly pleased with the arrangement. Some rules were not to be broken, however.

"I can't marry you," he'd said to her on their journey out to the westerlands. "Not unless Joffrey boots me out as he did old Selmy."

She had said nothing to him then, simply looked at him with her expressionless face, beautiful and blank. But some months later, she looks up from the book she has spent the morning reading to meet his eyes. He suspects she knows he has spent that entire time just looking at her.

"What do you want from me?" she asks. There is more than her usual faint curiosity, something genuine and deliberate he has not seen from her in so long.

"Something you would not care to give," he replies, honest as ever.

She seems to consider this, folding her hands demurely to rest on top of the book in her lap.

"Why do you not take it, then?"

He is angry that she has to ask; angry that she has to ask _him._

"Such a stupid little bird," he growls, but she doesn't even flinch.


	4. Chapter 4

"How is my sweet Sansa?" the King will ask, and Sandor will make some comment about how she spends her nights screaming. The only lie is the faint smirk he allows to curl at the corners of his mouth, but it's not as though Joffrey would be able to tell the difference.

Some at court think they understand the nature of his secrets. Yet when the Tyrells had thought to make an ally of him, Sandor had got as much information from them as possible, and reported all to the King. Lady Olenna is unlikely to enjoy exile, but she's a tough old bitch, she'll survive.

Yes, some at court think they understand, but what none has realised is this: no risk is small enough. Not for Sansa.


	5. Chapter 5

"Sansa," he says, his voice low with warning, "who in the seven bloody hells is that?"

Sansa smiles to herself in faint amusement. He has been gone for over two weeks. He deserves this. "Lord Clegane, may I present Lady Brienne of Tarth? She has come to rescue me."

Sandor's eyes flick between the large woman, now rising from her seat with one hand on the hilt of her sword, and Sansa herself. "Then why is she drinking my cider?"

"You would rather she drink your Dornish red, my lord?" Sansa enquires mildly, eliciting the anticipated growl of annoyance. She gives him a moment to formulate his response, then just before he can utter it she turns to Brienne and says, "Would you give us a moment, my lady?"

Brienne nods, and leaves the room, though Sansa knows she won't go far. Sandor's eyes watch her suspiciously, before returning to Sansa.

" _Rescue_ you?" he spits, incredulous.

Most anyone else would not approach the Hound when this mood is on him, but somewhere along the way Sansa has lost her fear of him. She walks up until she is close enough to touch him, though she doesn't.

"I'm still here, Sandor," she says quietly.

His left hand sits on his sword pommel, but the right clenches into a fist, knuckles white with the strain. "So is she," he hisses.

Sansa just gazes up at him – the only way to bring him down from his towering rages. "I like her," she explains. "We have become friends, since her arrival. You are gone so often, my lord, and she is a very good knight. I feel safer with her here."

There have been no more incidents like the stable hand, but Sansa learned caution when she learned fear – on the wrong side of Joffrey's amusement – and she has begun to truly hate it when Sandor returns to King's Landing. Brienne is no true substitute, but it has been so long since Sansa had a friend.

"You want her to stay." The words are flat, almost emotionless, but Sansa can see what it costs him to say them. She nods, and takes a breath, and then reaches out to touch his hand with her own. It is the first time she has sought to touch him since he brought her here. Him, or any man.

"Yes, I want her to stay."

It is the first time she has asked him for anything since he brought her here.

He sighs, a heavy sound, and the anger seems to blow out of him like the blossom in the trees outside the window. He is looking at her hand resting lightly on his.

"How can we trust her? Sansa. If you had any idea... she could pull everything down."

Sansa has only a vague idea of what he is talking about, but she knows that he has sacrificed much, risked much, and that they are both still vulnerable. It strikes her that he is scared, and that it is probably not for his own sake.

"Talk to her, then," she says. "But Brienne is the most honourable person I've met. I can't believe it's an act."

For a brief flash of an instant, the Hound looks oddly stung, and she wonders if she has somehow been unfair to him. But no, he is certainly not an honourable man. He is simply a good one.


	6. Chapter 6

“How old are you?” Sansa asks her one morning in the orchard.

“Five and twenty, my lady,” Brienne answers.

“And have you ever been with a man?” The question is more frank than she might have expected from a well-bred lady, but Sansa is a curious mix of courtesy and honesty. Brienne considers simply not answering, as she does not like to lie, but her companion’s expression is almost hungry, and Brienne finds it hard to deny her.

“I gave my maidenhead to Ser Jaime Lannister,” she says quietly, unable to keep the shame from her voice.

“Did you choose it?”

“Yes,” Brienne breathes.

“Then I am sorry for what happened to him, for your sake.” Brienne nods, but even now she cannot speak of it, the wound too raw. “I was eight-and-ten last month,” Sansa continues. “When I was six-and-ten Joffrey gave me as a gift to his loyal Hound. He was amused by the idea of making me a gift on my own nameday.”

“I am sorry, my lady,” Brienne says, barely knowing what else she _could_ say, but Sansa waves her off absently.

“I am not sorry.” She pauses for a moment, and they continue through the orchard as the spring sunshine warms their faces. When Sansa eventually speaks again, her voice is distant, detached somehow. “I did not choose to give my maidenhead as you did. I envy you that. There’s so little I’ve chosen in my life that I sometimes wonder if I hold back from him simply because I can.”

Brienne knows which _him_ Sansa is referring to. She does not pretend to understand the queer relationship Sansa has with her supposed captor, but she does know that he does not keep her here by force. “Is that such a bad reason?” she wonders, unsure of the answer herself.

“I do not know,” Sansa replies thoughtfully.

Later, at dinner, Brienne sits in silence watching as Sansa talks with Sandor Clegane. She is so contained, so careful in all of her actions, that when she places her hand lightly over his forearm where it rests on the table top, the otherwise casual action takes on a greater significance that none of them is blind to.


	7. Chapter 7

“Sansa,” he says on an indrawn breath, sitting up sharply in the dark of his bedchamber. She is standing over him like an apparition, candle in hand, hair flowing loose around a pale face. “What is it?” he asks impatiently, groping for his sword belt slung over the headboard.

“Shh.” Bending down she touches one delicate finger to his lips, before placing the candle down on the small table by his bedside. Then she pulls on the tie at the neck of her shift, and shrugs it from her shoulders. He means to protest, but the words strangle in his throat when she takes his hand and places it over one rounded teat. She puts a knee on the edge of the mattress and he leans back to accommodate her, though not far enough to avoid the kiss she drops lightly to his lips.

“What are you doing?” he says hoarsely.

“Shh,” she murmurs again, pushing him gently back into the mattress. “Shh. It will go more easily on you if you don’t resist, sweetling.”

Sandor freezes. “ _What?_ ”

The candle flickers, and he sees it reflect the wetness on her face. “Don’t scream,” she whispers, “or I’ll have to hurt you.”

“ _Sansa_. Stop it.” He shakes her. He doesn’t mean to, but force is what comes naturally to him. She cries out, one single loud sob ripped from her chest.

“I can’t,” she whispers, “I can’t. Please.”

He holds her tightly and she buries her face in his chest, shaking so hard it’s impossible to tell whether it comes from crying or some other source. When she is finally asleep he slips from the bed and wraps her carefully in a sheet. Then he dresses and summons Brienne to watch over his little bird, and goes to spend the rest of the night in a guest room.

Sleep will not come. It’s a relief.

In the morning she will not see him, so he speaks to Brienne instead. The path that lies before him has suddenly sharpened into focus during the long hours before dawn. He must go back to King’s Landing today, and when he returns home she will not be here. Brienne will finally be able to fulfil her oath to Lady Catelyn. And him... his future is uncertain, but he would have liked to have said goodbye to her face to face.


	8. Chapter 8

Joffrey is dead. It’s the first thing they hear on re-entering the north. Killed by some silent assassin, they say, sent by one of his many enemies. Seen by no one, only the result of his handiwork; a dead King in a pool of his own blood. Some say the Stranger himself came to slit Joffrey’s throat and drag him back down to the lowest of the seven hells. Sansa likes the images that conjures up, but she knows better than to believe it. The gods do not act through people: there are no gods; there are only people. Besides, she alone in the seven kingdoms knows the identity of the man who wielded the dagger.

She should have said goodbye to him.

The Bloody King, they’re calling Joffrey, though Sansa can’t help but wonder if ‘they’ are the same people who watched in wordless acceptance as he stripped her of every dignity. Let them all burn. The north will be safe.

Sansa has neither seen nor heard anything of the Hound since the night she pushed herself too far and fell from the edge of the cliff. At first she did not understand why he had sent her away after so long. She did not think one weeping woman enough to scare Joffrey’s Hound. But it’s a long journey north and Sansa has come to understand that she _had_ scared him, badly, and that this was the only way he knew to catch her.

She only wishes she had said goodbye to him.

Sansa continues north with Brienne, home to Winterfell, and makes her plans.


	9. Chapter 9

After it’s done, Sandor runs. Not because he’s a kingslayer, but because no one would believe that he is. He rides that night, Joffrey’s blood still wet on his breastplate, and doesn’t stop until he can steal a new horse. There are Tyrells on his heels, and outlaws ahead, and either would be more than happy to put his head on a spike.

Joffrey’s loyal Hound. Sandor laughs into the wind. Fuck the lot of them.

In truth, he had not expected to escape King’s Landing, but now he’s out of that stinking cesspit of a city, he knows where he’s going, and not even the gods could stop him.

Not even four hedge knights at the crossroads. He cuts them down with a fierce joy in the destruction of their bodies, and steals their supplies and their horses and gets on his way before their corpses have cooled. That’s the problem with adrenaline, though – it’ll win you impossible odds, and it’ll hide the cost until it’s too late. The wound on his leg won’t stop bleeding.

By the time he reaches Moat Cailin, he’s fevered and delirious, and in no condition to fight the men who pour forth at his approach. They carry spears and longswords and wear a merman on their livery – is that House Manderly? Is he in the north, then?

He hits the ground hard when one of them pulls him from the saddle, and lays in the dirt, laughing up at a cloudless blue sky. It’s a beautiful day, and he can see his little bird walking among the apple trees as the blossom blows from their branches and settles in her hair. She turns and smiles at him. Distantly he is aware of a spear being raised. Is he laughing, or crying? No matter. She’ll be the last thing he sees, and that makes him happy.


	10. Chapter 10

“He has been kept alive for you, my lady,” Harrion Karstark says, “so that you may have the satisfaction of passing judgement yourself.”

Sansa nods, trying to keep her composure in front of her bannermen, but she can feel it welling up inside, and when she finally lays eyes on his gaunt and sweating face she sobs aloud, hands flying to her mouth.

The lords of the north look at each other. Sansa knows they are not accustomed to seeing their lady in anything other than complete control. She does not care.

“Leave us,” she orders, hoarse with the tightness in her throat.

“My lady?” Lord Manderly protests.

“ _Leave!_ ”

Her voice seems to echo in the Great Hall, even after they’re gone. Blinded by tears, she kneels beside the litter and places her hands on his face, the good side and the burnt, then rests her head on his chest simply to be reassured that his heart is still beating.

“My lord,” she whispers. “Come back to me. Sandor. Come back to me.”


	11. Chapter 11

Sandor exists in the hinterland between living and dreaming. He hears singing, feels a cool cloth on his burning skin. There is pain, but there is comfort, too. A hand in his. A voice he recognises.

Did he make it to the north? He can’t remember. There is sadness, and so much regret it’s like a weight on his chest. But there is something to live for, too. A girl. Woman. Auburn hair, empty blue eyes he has nightmares about. Why must he live for her? Isn’t she safe, now? He took her away to be safe. Sent her away. A dog with a bone, Joffrey laughs, and Sandor says how delightful it is when she struggles. Struggles not to laugh when he comes back in from the hunt covered in mud. And she _did_ cry, but he didn’t make her. He didn’t make her. He held her. And he sent her away.

Why do you not take it, then?

Aye, why not? Is it because what you want _cannot_ be taken?

Such a stupid little bird. Such a stupid Hound. Nightingales sing sweeter in the sky than in the cage.

But there is something to live for. A voice he recognises. A hand in his. If he is brave enough to take it. There is pain.


	12. Chapter 12

“You’ll stay here at Winterfell.”

“Is that an order or a request, little bird?”

He doesn’t know if he’s a guest or a prisoner, and he suspects neither does she, but the fact remains that the new King has taken his lands, he’s a wanted criminal south of Moat Cailin, and there is really nowhere else he could go.

Sandor walks with a limp now, and feels every one of his thirty-three years. Sansa walks with her head held high, with the assurance of a control he could never give her.

She turns to face him, head tilted thoughtfully. “It’s a debt repaid,” she says.


	13. Chapter 13

It’s another full year before the seven kingdoms settle down to order once more. Sansa yields control back to King’s Landing, and is made Warden of the North in turn. Spring is slowly ceding to summer, and the northmen turn their attention to harvesting their crops and fattening their children.

Sandor gives Sansa a dagger for her nineteenth nameday, slim enough to fit in her boot so that she may wear it without ruining the line of her pretty gowns. She smiles, and it near breaks his heart how carefree she seems in that moment.

One day he notices how she takes his arm when they walk, and wonders when she started doing that. He can still remember a time when she would shy away from any touch.

One day she kisses him, and the godswood melts away to insignificance.

On that day, he falls to his knees in the pine needles and wraps his arms around her waist, hiding his face against the fabric of her bodice with long denied emotion.

“Don’t toy with me,” he begs.

“Look at me,” she orders, pushing gentle fingers under his chin. “I love you. I’m not afraid any more.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Scene inspired by [this](http://sandor-and-sansa.deviantart.com/gallery/?set=34243103&offset=24#/d4nsleg) beautiful drawing.


	14. Chapter 14

There’s no tearing of clothes. He’s wanted this for so long it’s a part of who he is now, and giving that up can’t be done all at once. In the dappled sunlight deep in the godswood, she helps him unbuckle his armour, and each piece removed is like a regret set aside, a lifetime of longing being collected up and piled neatly away.

She has him completely naked before he can begin on her clothing. He stands there before her while she casts her eyes over him, feeling vulnerable for the first time since childhood.

Sandor had always believed love to be a vulnerability, but what she is to him cannot be encompassed in such a small word. A man cannot love his heart or his lungs, but they are necessary to him. As she is.

“Won’t you undress me?” she asks with a small smile that speaks volumes to him. Her blue eyes are sparkling with warmth and something akin to amusement. She has never looked more lovely.

He unlaces her gown slowly, kissing each new part of her as it is revealed. There are marks on her skin, but there are marks on his too. All it shows is that they’ve been through life and come out the victors.

When she, too, is naked he lays her down on his cloak and loses himself in her skin – her belly, her teats, the hollow crook of her knee. Her hands roam his back, clutching at the hard muscles of his shoulders and biceps, and when she finally protests and demands that he take her, she wraps her legs around his waist and holds him to her so tightly he can barely move to pleasure her the way she whispers in his ear she wants. And so it’s slow, sweet torture, but when she digs her nails into the skin of his back, when she throws her head back in ecstasy, when Sandor bends to lick the bead of sweat that trickles between her teats – when she comes with his name on her lips, it’s everything.


	15. Chapter 15

Sansa smiles to see the child in her lord husband’s hands, cradled so gingerly she might laugh if her heart wasn’t burning with happiness.

“What shall we call her?” she asks, resting one tired hand on his thigh as he sinks heavily onto the edge of the bed.

So carefully, Sandor bends to kiss his daughter’s forehead, his eyes closed for several long moments before he looks up at Sansa, face alight with a fierce joy.

“Ours,” he rasps. Sansa smiles again.

“Ours,” she says.


End file.
